The first Taiwan-born American elected to the US House, David Wu represents Oregon's First Congressional District, the northwest corner of the state. He was first elected in 1998, and serves on committees dedicated to Education, science, and space exploration issues. He has occasionally sent bizarre, nonsensical emails, and has been photographed wearing outrageous costumes. Several former staffers have privately and, later, publicly urged Wu to seek psychiatric help.

Prior to his 2011 resignation over making sexual advances toward the daughter of a campaign donor, he was probably best known for a short, angry but amusing 2007 soundclip from the floor of Congress, in which he compared Bush administration insiders to Star Trek's slithery Klingons.